Missy Suicide on Burlesque, Beauty, and the SuicideGirls

Adam Reynoso, ’15 / Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

SuicideGirls are a group of women online who have taken their own twist on the classic pinup girl and the burlesque show. The group was founded and created by Missy Suicide, and Emertainment Monthly had the chance to speak with her before they stop by Boston’s House of Blues on November 2nd.

Missy Suicide took the time to talk about the Blackheart Burlesque tour, what it means to bring the art of the tease to a modern audience, how interactive their online community is with making their site, and how SuicideGirls show other forms of beauty that might not be as visible in the mainstream media.

Who are the SuicideGirls?

We started as a website 13 years ago to celebrate alternative beauty and spirit. It’s a pinup girl website that celebrates beauty in all forms, not just like the single, cookie cutter silicone, mainstream version of beauty. In the past couple of years, society’s acceptance of different forms of beauty has made a remarkable leap forward.

What drew the SuicideGirls to the burlesque scene?

It seemed like a natural progression. We did a burlesque show in 2003 right after starting the site. The girls had such a good time on the online community, they wanted to get together in real life and have an updated version of burlesque. We did it for five years but then took a break. It was a lot of work doing a world tour. We opened for Guns n’ Roses and Courtney Love on that tour.

What is the difference between burlesque and stripping?

Burlesque is the art of the tease. It’s sexy, revealing dance that comes in the tease. Stripping usually goes down to full nudity, but that is the intent. Burlesque is always the pasties, panties and its just about the art of the fun, silly sexy tease. The intent is different between burlesque and stripping. There’s spectacle in burlesque. You’re putting on a show. It’s supposed to be something that’s big, bold sexy and a different sort of experience.

How do you choose who becomes a Suicide Girl?

On the website, the girl applies on the site and their model coordinator helps them through the process, paperwork and getting their photo shoots set up. Then once they get their photo shoots, they submit it, if they get accepted, they become a “hopeful.” They get access to the community on the site and their photos go up and they get feedback from the community on their photos like if their photos are out of focus or if they need to show off the girl’s personality more, maybe they were too staged or maybe they were just perfect and the community loved them. Then she goes “pink” on the site and her set becomes set of the day. So the community really helps to decide who becomes a Suicide Girl. There are hundreds of hopefuls on the site and about over 2000 Suicide Girls from around the world, including Antarctica.

What were some of the other goals you had for creating the SuicideGirls?

I just wanted to show that confidence is the sexiest attribute a person can have and that the sooner you feel about yourself, then other people will see it too. Beauty and intelligence aren’t mutually exclusive. You can be smart and beautiful and sexy and enjoy all those aspects of yourself.

How do you choose who goes on tour with you?

The way that we choose the girls that go out on tour is that they obviously have to dance, have that ability as well as being a great representative of the site because they have to go out and meet so many fans from across the country and around the world. The girls have to be able to dance.

How would you describe your show that’s currently on tour?

Our burlesque show is a little different than the typical burlesque show. There’s still the sexy, fun strip tease aspect of it. But our show incorporates a lot of pop culture references like Game of Thrones, and it’s set to a very modern soundtrack. The girls have hardcore choreography that they do. It’s not just like, shimmying. It’s a really fun show and definitely unique.

What made you decide to deviate from the traditional burlesque form?

In the same way that we update the classic pinup girl for a modern age website, we wanted to take burlesque and put a modern twist on it. There’s so much good about the sexy spirit of burlesque that we wanted to update it and bring it to a modern audience.

When you tour these other countries, do you incorporate other models into the show from those countries?

We do have different girls in different countries that will come out and make guest appearances.

What’s the audience like?

Over half of the audience that comes out to our shows is women. It’s because the girls are beautiful in a non-intimidating way. They’re approachable and that’s appealing to women. There aren’t many places for women to see other women that are not picture perfect model, that are not that unattainable picture of beauty. It’s appealing to women.

What do you have to say about the way burlesque has entered the mainstream media with people like Dita Von Teese?

She’s amazing and she’s done so much to bring about a healthy view of your body and sexuality. She’s brought that conversation to the world, that it’s okay to be sexy and to be beautiful and to be not the typical girl. She did maternity bras, and it’s so cool that she did something that women should feel sexy in all points in their lives.

What are some of the other medias the SuicideGirls have been in?

We had six movies on Shotime and we’re getting ready to have our seventh. It’s awesome. Our movies are very pretty and beautiful and lovely. We were also on CSI: NY and it was crazy because we were playing ourselves on TV and it was very meta. But it’s hard to play yourself, saying what you would say what someone else thinks you would say.

What are your plans for the next year?

We’re going to start the year in London and do a club run. And from there, we’re gonna see about taking the tour to Asia and would love to go to South America. We have a lot we want to do.

Check out the SuicideGirls and their popular Blackheart Burlesque tour on their website.